Satellite Frequency Bands

There are a number of radio frequency ranges in use in satellite communications
such as C, X, Ku, Ka and even EHG and V-band. To prevent interferance caused
by multiple sites transmitting on the same frequencies, government agencies
and standards organizations around the globe try to keep the usage
organized and often such controls take the form of government regulations
which carry the weight of law.

In the United States, the Federal Communications
Commission periodically holds frequency
auctions to sell available spectrum. Unauthorized
use of
regulated frequencies without authorization by the United States
government or by its current lease-owner is punishable by fines or jail
time.

Earth stations use unregulated frequencies within their facilities. Earth
stations need to manipulate and transport the data in the signal without interfering
with other radio communications in the area. The frequencies earthstations
use are often in the same ranges as local radio and television broadcasts
which can cause interferance for both parties even if they are not on the
same frequency. Thus, radio shacks and/or the devices within them
are heavilly sheilded to prevent such interferance.

Satellites use different, higher frequencies that are regulated. At
the engineering level, there is what is known as sideband which
is frequency spectrum that is set aside to create a separation between frequencies
to prevent transmissions using adjacent frequencies from interfering with
each other.

Satellites have power and regulatory restrictions governing which frequencies
they may use. In addition, there are other requirements such as weather that
may restrict use of certain frequencies. Below is a chart listing the approximate
ranges of each frequency band.